In a recent interview with the Seattle Times, Bungie’s president Harold Ryan and its creative director Joseph Staten elaborated a bit on the company’s upcoming Halo 3: ODST, and dropped a rather compelling piece of info regarding the next-next Halo installment, Halo: Reach, as it pertains to a little something called Project Natal.

Considering that the Halo franchise has been the defining series for Microsoft and the Xbox since it began, it’s hardly surprising that Bungie would be a major player in Project Natal’s “launch” as well. It also wouldn’t be surprising if Natal is released around the same time Reach hits shelves in the fall of 2010. How Natal and Halo will work together is anyone’s guess at this point, but I can pretty much guarantee that 99 percent of players will want to use the technological marvel to deliver the most realistic face-squatting in gaming history.

On the topic of Halo 3: ODST, Staten said that in addition to the “hard-boiled” noir-ish storytelling and dialogue, ODST’s gameplay is also a bit of a departure for the Halo franchise as well.

"We're doing a lot of pretty neat things in terms of mixing it up, introducing some non-linearity, some free exploration. This is also a mystery story so there's a lot more clue-finding and mystery-solving than you would normally find in a game of this kind — nothing that strays too far from the fun 'Halo' experience, but we definitely decided to take a little bit of risk and have some fun with this one."

What do die-hard Halo fans think of the new open-world approach for Halo 3: ODST? Aside from the aforementioned use, what ideas do you have for how Natal will be used for Halo: Reach?